Consider this a Public Service Announcement for the rest of society that is not currently in reeducation - oops, professional development - over the summer as a public school educator.
Unless you’re in the profession, you don’t know how bad it is. By it, I mean the public school system and by bad, I mean anti-white, anti-capitalist, anti-science, and anti-American. Did you think your tax dollars were paying to continue developing teachers in the areas of literacy instruction or mathematical modeling? How quaint.
There is hardly a whisper of instructional improvements anymore. In fact, teachers are being brainwashed to think that the whole system was built by and in order to benefit white students, so any attempt at improving reading pedagogy is just abetting institutional racism.
Sounds like a farce, right? It’s not.
Your tax dollars are entirely endorsing a Marxist philosophy and supporting the cultural reeducation of school employees about their inherent white privilege and white systemic racism as a whole. You may have heard a white liberal friend referring to a trendy title they read this summer like White Fragility or How to Be an Anti-Racist, but for those on the inside these pop culture forces are just the tip of the iceberg. In their work-mandated and tax-dollar funded sessions, white teachers actively learn to not only identify the ways they have societal white skin privilege, but are taught to feel guilt, shame, and remorse for that same white skin and their connection to historical sins against blacks. You know, because they owned slaves and participated in Jim Crow segregation. Apparently, the whites that fought to expand or preserve freedoms in any of our noble wars or those that went to the South in the 1960s and died trying to bring about voting rights don’t count in this equation of white evil.
What’s more, we elevate black and brown voices in these conversations to the point of infallibility. This presents a scary tangent. As it stands currently, whites go out of their way to make all people feel included (Exhibit A - this charade); do you honestly think whites will get a fair shake if and when roles are reversed? Look at African nations that ripped away farms from white landowners or how CHAZ developed into a quasi-racial hierarchy. That’s not good for anyone that wants a just society focused on improving everyone’s situation. America’s arc of moral justice has always been swinging in everyone’s favor, evidenced by the eventual outlawing of the slave trade to outright emancipatio of slavery; or, women earned the right to eventually vote; or, the Civil Rights Act enshrined equal legal protections; or, gay marriage has been legalized and normalized. Just don’t count on it to continue if this development implodes.
For years, but with an incredible push since the forced capitulation of societal norms and decency that began at the end of May, public education has gone to plaid in its effort to fulfill its Marxist aims that attempt to dismantle alleged privileges of white skin and eradicate white systemic racism in schools. Nothing short of destroying everything we know is the end goal.
All of this should frighten the bejesus out of every American because A) The cultural power of leftism is increasingly growing, B) Many teachers are still in child-rearing stages of life, which means this drivel is literally being homegrown, and C) In just a few years the recipients of this inanity will graduate in huge numbers believing that we live in a racist, sexist, and economically disadvantaged system. Scenes from Minneapolis, Portland, or Chicago will be the norm, as justified rage sweeps the streets looking and looting for retribution.
For schools themselves - and this includes the majority-white suburban schools, where families live out conservative values and vote Democrat because they think they’re better than you and me, thus allowing the problem to worsen - the rise in anti-oppressive work reflects in areas of 1) student management, 2) curricular goals, and 3) most frighteningly, a values realignment that all staff are coerced to make lest they lose their noble livelihood.
This three-part series will explore each of these concepts in greater depth. Part 1 of the series explores what is considered student management. Let’s dive in.
In urban schools across the country, the gist of the narrative that contends schools are just one more structure of institutional racism exists because of two numerical realities: the fact that consequences issued by schools are not proportional relative to the general demographics (covered in this article) and the fact that academic outcomes are likewise distorted (covered in Part 2).
In short, black male students are suspended at a higher rate than their black female peers and at a significantly higher rate than their non-black peers, especially Asians, who just do not get suspended. This is true at any level, whether viewed from one of a district, city, county, or state. The word they use is disproportionality. Here’s how it works: If a school has 100 students, 50 of whom are black and 50 of whom are white, and there are 20 suspensions throughout a school year, the typical school would have anywhere between 13-16 suspensions of black students and just 4-7 for white students.
Because half of the imagined school is black, these educated morons would also expect to see half of the suspensions impacting black students. In an idealized vacuum of a world, perhaps that would be true. But we live in reality and it’s not, so racism is at work, they tell us.
Now, for normal people, these numbers are simply the result of a disparity in suspendable actions. Black male students generally outcommit infractions than their non-black male peers. The reasons are varied, some unfortunate at best and downright tragic at worst, yet ultimately irrefutable.
Significant classroom disruptions could be one example. There are horror stories out of elementary schools where maladjusted five-year-olds wreak havoc on their environments everyday. These little guys toss every crayon, pencil, notebook, chair, and even tables across their learning spaces, all at the peril of their peers’ safety. Indeed, sometimes other young and innocent students are caught in the crossfire and suffer life-debilitating concussions. Do you want to be the parent whose child has been irreparably harmed by this chaos? Voting Republican doesn’t eradicate it, but voting Democrat definitely condones it.
The protocoled response is always the same: Classrooms evacuate, the dangerous tantrums continue, and because suspensions are usually banned for such little bodies, the tiny offenders are subsequently returned to the original setting after it is picked up and a brief reflection has occurred. Maybe, just maybe, if this happens every day for a week their teacher and class might get a one-day reprieve. Hence, the suspensions begin.
Then there are the issues of fighting. In racially-diverse urban schools, made up of perhaps black, white, Hispanic, and Asian bodies, it is disproportionality black male students getting in physical altercations. Again, not picking on black males, but that is the data. Black students themselves will tell you they feel angry, disrespected, or had to get back at so-and-so. To demonstrate how poisoned the minds of school leaders are, there are even anecdotes from disgusting school administrators who actually celebrate the rare fights among their Asian or Hispanic populations because it “evens out the suspension numbers.” Mind you, that was their first thought. Not, are they ok or what happened?
Whoever fights, though, guess what? You can’t fight in school. It is not safe for bystanders, it is not safe for the participants, although after the 10th fight you wonder if getting hurt is the only teacher left, and it isn’t how we raise people to solve problems. Oops, that last part is my whiteness showing. Amazingly, not every fight even results in a suspension. Schools are pushing more and more for restorative justice practices, which is a solid tool in theory and occasional practice because kids deserve several chances, but the line needs to be drawn somewhere, especially after repeated issues. Right now there is no line. Every medical profession, like the CDC (liberals love the CDC and its science, right?) and especially psychologists, advocate for consistent structure to optimize effective child development. This isn’t rocket science, and yet here we are, removing all structure because the school system is apparently racist.
Worst of the suspendable actions is the student violence perpetrated against teachers and effectively condoned by districts that dare not reprimand, let alone suspend, a black student. Almost every day, a buried news report features a teacher who suffered a serious concussion from having their head slammed in a wall or from being punched in the face. An intrepid Indiana reporter found hundreds of such cases. This Seattle story could be written for any large city school. Why are teachers so afraid of returning COVID and yet willing to brave a far worse threat from student violence?
A most incredible act plays out when urban educators speak to their white liberal counterparts in suburbs and explain what happens when their policies they support (i.e. remove suspensions and repeat the mantra that “schools are racist,” therefore allowing dangerous behaviors to go unchecked and unpunished) are in effect. Since these insulated fools work in functioning schools with mostly respectful students, they can’t even fathom episodes of teacher violence. They disbelieve the stories, or worse, believe that racist teachers probably incited it.
To be fair, schools aren’t entirely clueless. Districts have created staff positions designed specifically for responding to unruly students around or deescalating the anger they manifest, although these positions routinely, and understandably, turn over as people can ultimately only take foot stomps, leg kicks or stomach punches for so long. Staff in these positions that are pregnant endure such violence. You think that stops some of the psychopathic tendencies displayed by some kids? Again, how would you feel if it was your wife or daughter enduring such violence?
Your cozy white liberal school might not employ them, but if you’re curious, go to the district homepage of any urban center schools and peruse the career section. In Oakland, they are called Behavior Intervention Specialists; in Chicago they have positions called School Climate Team Specialist as well as the Alternative and Augmentative Communication Specialist; and in Washington, D.C. there are positions called the Student Resource Coordinator. They exist solely to reconcile the expectations of a school with the demonstrated behaviors of predominantly black students.
Of course, none of this is new. It’s the same nonsensical approach that happens with the policing of black communities. According to the FBI database, blacks commit half of all violent crimes every year despite making up just 13-14% of the general population, so it makes sense that there is a higher representation of black males in communities with a greater police presence or in prison relative to their population. Airhead commentators and agenda-driven politicians cite the disproportionality as proof positive of a racist America, without ever looking at absentee fatherism or personal choice (personal responsibility is a white trait).
The obvious takeaway from any data is that black students are suspended more often because they engage in more behaviors that are detrimental to a safe and productive learning environment. For anyone that disagrees with that statement, I challenge you to spend even a day as a substitute teacher in an urban school. It will only take the first thirty minutes of the day for you to change your mind. Your bleeding heart or your liberal values mean nothing to little guys in distress. If anything, that attitude just gets taken advantage of and the cycle continues.
Now, this is not to suggest that only black students destroy classrooms, fight their peers, or hurt adult staff. Not in the least. It shouldn’t even be read as a diatribe against black students. From a conservative perspective, we believe that all students are capable of creating a successful future for themselves, as measured by familial or material happiness, and should likewise be held to the same high standard as everyone else. You do A, you get B. It can be good or bad. Have black families encountered additional hurdles because of individual racists or elements of widespread racism? No doubt. If and when that occurs it should be named and called out. I believe our society does an overly good job of that. Ironically, but to their apparent forced ignorance, it is the debasing and demanding policies of expecting less from blacks that we find ourselves in such a quagmire.
All that being said, statistically it is just likelier that black students engage in these behaviors. If that weren't the case, there’d be no need to discuss the concept of disproportionality. Moreover, it's worth repeating that this doesn’t mean we get to write off the challenges any of our students enter school with. What makes a little kid so angry and violent? Schools should be safe havens, and as such these are questions everyone ought to be asking. Right now it's easier to scream "racism!"
Moreover, if we allow such atrocities to go on in school-age youths, is it any wonder we watch mayhem take over our city streets across the country? They grow up thinking this is how you change the system and why the system even needs to be changed. Schools have wrought this mindset and perpetuated its regeneration through their terriblely enabling policies.
So, that’s the issue of student management these days, which boils down to a very real problem in schools that gets addressed through an intentionally false interpretation of numbers and to which the overused and impotent charge of racism is attached. How has all this been working out (voting Democrat, assigning make-believe notions of systemic racism to real problems, etc.)? If an ostrich sticks its head in the sand long enough, does the lion just walk away?
At least now you can’t say you didn’t know.
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